Che Čeng

Admiral He Cheng - eunuch and sailor


( 1360 - 1433)



Zheng Che was a Chinese Muslim and served in the imperial court as a eunuch. His exceptional knowledge of seamanship was put to use by Emperor Jung-le of the Ming Dynasty. At his behest, He Cheng undertook seven major naval expeditions to establish footholds for Chinese trade and to dominate important shipping routes in the Indian Ocean.


The first expedition, between 1405 and 1407, went to the coast of the West Indies, to Champa, Java, Sumatra, Ceylon and Calcutta in India. A total of 27,000 men on 60 large ships took part under Cheng's command.


The second and third expeditions, from 1407 to 1411, visited Cochinchina, the Greater Sunda Islands, India, and Ceylon, where he obtained for his emperor the vassalage of the king of Ceylon and the lucrative royalties resulting therefrom.


A fourth expedition, undertaken between 1413 and 1415, led even further west, reaching Hormuz on the Persian Gulf. Zheng used this expedition to establish trade and diplomatic relations with Persia and the local Muslim rulers.


On his fifth and sixth expeditions, from 1417 to 1419 and 1421 to 1422, Zheng's fleet accompanied foreign envoys that had arrived in China as a result of the establishment of diplomatic relations during the previous expeditions, and passed through Aden in Yemen to Malindi on the coast of East Africa. During this mission, Cheng even managed to bring a giraffe to the imperial court as a gift from the Muslim Sultan of Mogadishu.


The purpose of the seventh and last expedition between 1431 and 1433 was to visit seventeen countries in the Persian Gulf region and East Africa, with the simultaneous pilgrimage of Cheng and other Chinese Muslims to Msekka, which every Muslim must undertake at least once in his lifetime.


In later years, a move towards continental politics and away from naval expeditions prevailed in the Chinese court, closing China off to the rest of the world for many centuries. Not much has survived about Zheng himself and his life, but detailed accounts of the expeditions by some of the participants exist.
URL : https://www.valka.cz/Che-Ceng-t24302#90708 Version : 0
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